To Build a House of Stone
by MissJaneInTheSun
Summary: What better place to Live Happily Ever After than in the land that is Fairest of Them All? After months of planning the Curse has worked; almost everyone from FTL is in Storybrooke and the new mayor couldn't be happier. Until someone she thought she'd never see again reappears: "What do you think you're up to, dearie? It's a curse; it's not meant to be pleasant."
1. Chapter 1

_I've got an idea about the Curse, and about Regina. I'm hoping I'm better at explaining it through fic than any other way. Eventual Swan Queen._

**To Build a House of Stone**

**Chapter 1**

**1983 **

Regina walked down the paved edge of Storybrooke's main street. She getting used to the fast, metal, carriages that rolled down the street, and to all the people who knew her name, and smiled when they saw her.

It was cold, much colder than it ever had been in fairytale land, but Regina was so distracted that she hardly noticed. There were so many signs to read (adverting things she'd couldn't even guess at – 'dry cleaning'?!), and as well as the metal carriages, there was noise that sounded like music but there were no bands that she could see (and it was often particularly loud inside small shops). Oh, and the shops! There were clothes in colours she's never even dreamed of, and shoes that appeared to made from crocodile, and a shop that sold little baby plants in pots that you could take home with you, and fruits and vegetables that surely didn't grow in a climate like this; there was snow falling and Regina was eating a _banana_!

By far the strangest thing, though, was all the smiles around her. Not that people hadn't smiled in the Enchanted Forest, but they hadn't smiled at her, and often when she had met people who weren't her family it was because they were coming to her as Queen, with tales of hardship and begging for help. No one here wore rags or sold matches on street corners.

She would have to learn – re learn – who all these happy people were. She had names for them of course, but they seemed to have new names now. And new jobs. She'd run into Snow White outside the elementary school. She appeared to be a teacher. _How had that happened? Did Snow have the sort of empathy and moral compass that was required to instruct small children?_ Regina had smiled at her all the same, and asked to see the school, which had pleased her immensely. It consisted of several large buildings, each of them heated and with rugs from wall to wall in every room. All the children were well dressed and other than one boy standing in a corridor defiantly screaming, "It wasn't me, Miss!" they all appeared happy.

Regina was happy too. She had woken that morning, alone, in a warm, soft bed. When she'd opened her eyes she'd been able to see that the sky was grey and snowflakes were hitting the glass, but inside the room the air as warm, and smelt sweetly of apples and cinnamon. She'd got herself out of bed and looked in the closet for something to wear. So many clothes! How did she become someone with so many changes of clothes? And some of them so _scanty_!? The underwear for one was so small that she wondered at first how it wasn't going to disappear into unpleasant places. On the other hand, stockings attached to underwear cleverly removed the need for the garters or the likelihood of wardrobe malfunctions.

In the kitchen she'd found fresh food and even managed to make toast herself. It turned out that there was something immensely rewarding in preparing your own food.

The only trouble of the morning had been when she'd initially wandered outside in search of the water closet, and been distracted by the garden (would she need to care for itself, or were there servants of some somewhere?) and almost had to give-in and 'go' behind a tree, before discovering, that luxury of luxury, there was a water closet indoors - even if it took a while to work out how it operated.

Now outside in the main street her happiness stayed with her and kept her warm as she walked under the grey arms of the wintertime trees, and children in coats and hats, freed from school for the day, ran along the street adding noise and colour. She couldn't quite remember a day like this ever before. There was nothing looming on her horizon that she needed to be thinking carefully about, or planning for or hiding from, and it appeared there was nothing to regret: everyone was safely out of Fairy Tale Land, and while deprived of their memories, they had food and education and heating and indoor plumbing. Regina smiled to herself and had to restrain herself from doing a little skip. The 'curse' had worked.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

**1984**

Being Mayor was fun. It was kind of like being Queen, but rather than it all being about goblin wars and chests of gold and who might be marrying who, it was sanitation and the school board and things that her constituents actually _needed_. Who was it had thought about those things in the Enchanted Forest? _Each for their own_, she guessed.

There were stressful days; like when the accountant (who actually enjoyed it when she had accidently referred to him as 'the Bean Counter') told her that there wasn't enough money for her plans, or when she made a fool of herself over failing to know how to use some piece of machinery, or the discovery that, as beautiful and practical as they were, the red rubber boots on her back porch were not intended to be worn indoors.

In the evenings she read the magazines she found in the newsagents and learned a lot about dressing, and about the workings and morals of this new world. She was learning to cook as well. It turned out that there _was_ as servant who came to do the garden. Her name was Michelle - although Regina had an inability to not call her Mistress Mary - and she showed Regina how to work the appliances in her kitchen with no payment other than slices of pie and bowls of soup.

* * *

Michelle (_must remember to call her that_) intrigued Regina. Regina couldn't say that she'd ever really had a friend before, and now, here was this woman who came into her house and sat in her kitchen and ate her food, and laughed with her and taught her things, and told her about her own life, and appeared to want almost nothing in return. Michelle, it turned out, had a girlfriend, rather than a boyfriend. From her reading, Regina was aware that while some people in this land frowned on that sort of thing, it wasn't actually unusual.

"What a fantastic world this is, that we can be so happy," said Regina one rainy evening, as Michelle dried off in front of the fire before making preparations to go home.

"It's odd you say that, Madame mayor, because I don't really know if I agree with you or not."

Regina cocked her head, and handed Michelle another towel.

"You were obviously talking about me and Betsy, and I sure I am glad that I don't live in another time, or in pretty much any other country on earth, but although I have so many things that should make me happy, sometimes I have this odd feeling that there's something missing; something I'm not seeing, or something really big that I should know. Do you know what I mean?"

"No," answered Regina truthfully.

"For instance, what about your childhood?" asked Michelle.

"What about it?" answered Regina, "There's not much that I need to remember from it."

"That's the thing, exactly," said the gardener, "I feel like I had this fairytale childhood full of summer and roses and singing, but when I try to recall the details there aren't any. Sometimes everything seems very foggy."

"It sounds very pleasant, if you ask me," said Regina.

Michelle took some sort of exception to Regina's reply;

"You might be fine with saying that, but I hardly think it's pleasant that I feel like I didn't really have my past at all."

"Then maybe you should see a doctor," said Regina. Sitting back in her chair, her mouth suddenly hardening. "It doesn't seem normal."

Michelle, her dried hair now tied up, and her boots on ready to leave, turned back to her friend, who was sipping her cider and looking out the window. "That's hardly a friendly thing to say, Regina. I don't need a shrink. I need understanding – from a friend."

"Well, I don't understand, so I don't know how I can help."

"Okay. Be like that." Michelle picked up the last of her things and headed for the door. "I'll see you next week at the same time. Remember, don't go cutting the blossoms off the apple trees no matter how pretty they are, or you won't get fruit."

* * *

Regina stayed where she was, sipping her drink and feeling the alcohol sink into her brain. Was Mary really upset about not having clear memories of her childhood? How could it matter that much to her that she'd walk off in huff? What happened in childhood anyway? _Lessons, scoldings, endless hours of being told not to talk because adults were._ Why would anyone want to remember all that with any sort of clarity. She would gladly lose her memories of childhood and have them replaced with the sunny pastel imagery that Mary had.

The biggest thing on her mind though, wasn't childhood, but the Curse. Of course, she had carefully worked with Rumplestiltskin to make sure that everybody who was a 'victim' of the curse wouldn't remember anything. That had kind of been the _point_. She hadn't factored in that anyone might be upset by their inability to remember the past. What more could she do, that what she'd offered Mary/Michelle; counselling. There was a psychiatrist in town; she'd see his plaque. He'd be able to make people feel better about the reality they faced. Then again, if no one other than herself remembered their childhoods, then normal was just the experience of the majority, wasn't it? It was she, Regina, who most likely needed the help of a professional, if she was going to go through 28 years of having to pretend to be like everyone else.


	3. Chapter 3

Welcome to Chapter 3.

_Apologies for the time it's taken to get this chapter up. I had a whole lot planned out, but got quite dispirited due to the whole "Canon got in the way" thing. But then the story got some more followers and I felt so bad for letting you down if I didn't keep going. So, um, let's just call this an AU and move on ;) _

_Here it is. Some more Regina Mills before Henry, before Emma, before ..._

_Also I have gone back and dated the first few chapters so that there can be both a sense of time passing and of structure to what's going on here._

* * *

**Chapter 3**

**1984 part2**

As it turned out Regina did meet the town's psychiatrist, Archie Hopper, the very next day. The City was having a meeting of the hospital board and Dr Hopper was there. And he made an impression on Regina, not only because she'd been thinking about him the evening before, nor because she remembered who he 'used' to be and this was somewhat of a come-up in the world, but because amongst all the arguing and passive aggressive behaviour at the meeting, he'd been calm and thoughtful and considered. If she ever needed to draw a court around herself, Archie Hopper as the sort of man who Regina would have liked to have on her side.

She approached him after the meeting.

"Dr Hopper, I presume." She held out a hand and he took it,

"Why yes, Mayor Mills. How nice to meet you."

"Likewise."

At this point conversation stalled. Regina wasn't sure what she wanted from him, other than she had a feeling that she might need something one day.

"My card, Dr Hopper."

Dr Hopper took the card, but instead of simply putting it in his pocket and walking away, he extended an invitation for Regina to join him for a coffee. Regina was taken aback at first. No one had ever _invited_ her anywhere; it was she made the plans and others who followed (or, on occasion, others simply declared that she was accompany them, however those were times best not dwelt on). But, of course, Mr Hopper didn't remember who either he or she had been previously, and this overtly affable disposition and trusting attitude that meant people wanted to spend time with complete strangers seemed to be a feature of Storybrooke. (Or, had it always been a part of these people's lives, and only now was she aware of it?).

In the diner they sat by the window. Archie let Regina order her own drink. Like Michelle, he spoke in a quiet, 'conversational' tone. He asked questions and tipped is head to the side as she answered them. His questions were a tad more personal that Michelle's ever had been, and Regina wasn't sure if she was comfortable giving out this sort of information. Yes, it was apparently very Storybrooke (and very 1984 United States of America judging by some of the things she read in magazines) to be happy discussing your innermost thoughts, but just as Regina had never been invited out for coffee before, she'd never had people around who wanted to know anything about what she _felt_ about anything.

Archie asked Regina about her job. Did she enjoy it? What had made her interested in governance?

Regina wasn't sure. She wasn't even sure at first what he meant; she was the ruler because that was who she was. However, obviously people in Storybrooke felt that they had some level of control over what they were doing in life, so all these people thought that she had _decided_ to rule them. And, really, in a way she had. She did enjoy her job; it was her duty. And she had decided to take on the role, because... because it was her duty. Was that a choice?

Archie sipped his coffee and pondered the idea of a sense of duty with her.

Later, conversation moved to where it always seemed to in Storybrooke: childhood. Like Michelle, Archie Hopper also seemed to have some sort of obsession with childhood – although with hers, not his.

"Tell me about your mother?" he asked and was very lucky that he didn't get Regina's coffee in his face. In an instant, with just the merest thought of her mother, she went from pensively pondering the nature of duty to being almost overwhelmed by a rage:

"No one talks about my mother," was her response. "If I ever, ever hear her spoken about I will – " here she flailed, both because her own tone of voice was so reminiscent of Cora that she almost scared herself, and because here, in Storybrooke, what was there that she would be able to do? _I will raise your taxes? I will screw up the traffic flow?_

"Fetch me my coat, I need to return to work."

The doctor stayed where he was. Yes, yes, people here didn't have the same attitude towards helping her out as they had before, but she required her coat.

"I'm sorry Regina." Rather than moving towards the coat rack Archie reached across the table and pushed the glass with the last of her coffee towards her. "I've obviously touched nerve and I apologise, but don't go before you finish your coffee."

Regina visibly relaxed, but it was only because she did indeed want to finish her drink. And because not getting riled up and not disappearing into blinding flashes of anger was something that she had come into this new life for. So she sat back in her seat and picked up the coffee. The tension between them eased, and then,

"By the way," Archie said, as he too finished his drink, "I really like what you've done with your hair."

Regina's body stiffened again. _What?! Is the bug coming onto me? _All her happy thoughts about friendship that maybe men in this place were not as intent one The One Thing as they were in the past, dropped. This wasn't a rage, like with the mention of Cora, but more a great weight and a great disappointment; was there to be 28 years of this sort of behaviour?

"Sorry," Archie said again. "I seem to have got off on the wrong foot here, and I hope you're not getting the wrong idea. I simply mean that I am always interested when a person makes a dramatic change to their appearance. And the cutting of hair can be such a symbolic act. Not that it is for everyone, of course."

By this time Archie was perched on the edge of his seat, as if ready to jump the second Regina hit out at him. Instead she put her now empty cup down and the table and nodded.

He was right that Hopper; there had been something hugely symbolic and liberating about cutting her hair. Oh, she had had some fun playing with her hair, but at the same time when she could have been doing something interesting instead she was sitting while someone played with her hair. Which was another point; cutting her hair meant that, in one more way, she was now able to be independent. Most importantly removing that mane from her removed the tag of 'Princess' from her. Everyone she knew (even people in Storybrooke, she was sure) knew that Royalty was recognisable by their hair. Or at least the female royals. There was even a Princess Regina had heard about once, told as a story to entertain a Fairy Tale Land girl sitting through hours of combing and preening, about a Princess who had been stolen way but then rescued because her beautiful hair was recognised.

And Archie was right; she did still look good with shorter hair. She was still going to be Fair, without having to be a Princess-Girl whose only aim in life was to secure the role of Queen.

Regina ran a hand through her hair and leant forward in her seat,

"Tell me, Mr Hopper, what do you remember of your own childhood?"

"Very little I'm afraid."

"And does that worry you?"

"My training tells me that it should, but, in truth, Regina, I feel like not being able to clearly remember my childhood is probably a blessing."

"I'm glad to hear that."

* * *

On the walk back to her office from the diner, Regina saw another familiar face.

This one wasn't friendly.

Well, it had been once. Once upon a time, that had been the only face that had made her feel welcomed, or needed or protected, or loved. Now it made her feel light-headed, and it made her heart race.


	4. Chapter 4

**Yet again a long pause between updates. I really am sorry. In good news though, I have been watching Season 1 on dvd (there were several episodes I missed when it was on tv because I was overseas, and I thought that my Tumblr addiction meant that I hadn't missed a whole lot, but seeing the entire series in correct order is giving me all sorts of motivations to remember why I wanted to write this), and it is winter and dark and I have time to curl up in front of the fire with wine and chocolate while I write.**

**As a reminder of where we were up to, it was the early 1980s. Regina was happy in Storybrook, making friends and learning about the 20****th**** Century, until she saw someone who gave her a shock...**

CHAPTER 4

1984

_What the fuck was Rumplestiltskin doing in Storybrooke?_

Once she'd recovered enough to stand without gripping the edge of the nearest building she thought that she would walk the opposite way. There was no need to go all weak; he need not have seen her. And, if the curse had been as successful as it seemed to be, maybe he would call her Mayor Mills? Maybe he would walk right past and she could go back to being a young woman with a house of her own and a beautiful garden and time to cook and to make friends, and who was helping people every single day.

_Of course it can't possibly __be__ him. It was an illusion. It was her own mind playing tricks on her; it was her inability to believe that she deserved anything as wonderful as this chance she now had to live out 28 years in peace. (This was the sort of shit that happened to ones brain after accepting a drink with a bug who had magically acquired a PhD.)_

So Regina Mills kept walking. She went back to her office. She sat at her desk and - and leant back in chair, surrounded by reports that she couldn't bring herself to read. All she could do was keep running the scene of that little man, disappearing into a shop, through her mind. The old, impetuous Regina would have marched right around there to that pawn shop and found out if it really was him. This one? This one really was the same person, it was just that she was trying very hard to be someone different. However she had already put a lot of effort into controlling her desire to tell people exactly how she felt today, so not reacting was testing her.

_Off with his head! Out with his heart!_ Regina got up from the chair and paced heavily back and forwards across her office. _Relax,_ she told herself. _Look in the mirror. You're not an Evil Queen; you're Regina Mills. _

Moving her head slightly she felt her cropped hair against her cheekbones. She looked down at her legs in tailored black pants. Running her hands down over her hips she felt Dr Hopper's card in her pocket. Looking down at the desk beside her she saw a note from Michelle reminding her about watering the rose bushes. There were her keys too. She had a house of her own now. It had a lock on the door and she could got here and be far away from anyone and anything that was able to hurt her, and she could only invite people she liked and trusted. She didn't need to go seeking out old friends. Or old enemies.

She had achieved a lot. She had a lot to lose.

The curse had worked. She didn't need to go backwards. She the ingredients of a successful life. She didn't need more. She did not need Rumple-fucking-stiltskin. There were budgets to balance and meetings to chair. She went back to her seat, called to order lunch to eat-in and began to read the reports.

-x-

Regina never tired of learning more about this amazing world she had come into. There was food for breakfast that came in boxes made of very, very thin wood and which was served with milk and which _everyone_ ate (she had asked). And a 'machine' that washed clothes and linen (and wasn't washing linen the most awkward thing ever? Regina felt as though she has escaped from the clutches of a giant damp clinging sea monster after wrangling ever load between the washer and the dryer). Most of all she loved the ideas: _the Magna Carta_ with its plans for freedom from tyranny; all those planets around the sun making up the Solar System. No wonder the public buildings like the schools and library and the museum were the biggest buildings in the town; there was so much information to store and to share.

Regina particularly liked the museum, with its focus on objects. She found time at least once a week to visit. This Saturday she was expected to attend the opening of a drinking fountain, and as it was only a block from the museum she figured that that was her afternoon planned out.

-x-

Regina stood in front of the (strangely large?) crowd ready to make a brief a speech, cut the ribbon and declare the thing open. She had chosen to wear a shirt that was open at the neck, and scarf that was more form than function, but now felt the biting wind cutting right through to her bone which, combined with the staring crowd, was making her wish that the whole thing was over. She hadn't come to Storybrook to stand up like this and be pompous in front of crowds. She wasn't sure why a drinking fountain needed such a pretentious beginning at all. Her assistant had said that it was a "triumph over bureaucracy," with at least three different departments having been involved in designing and approving it and, judging by the number of business owners lined up to her left, it was funded by half the town. It was ridiculous to have so much fuss over such a tiny thing, unless... Regina suddenly looked around the crowd in horror. Here she'd been, assuming that everyone in Storybook had the same sort of lifestyle that she did at 108 Mifflin St, but supposing that they were all excited by the drinking fountain because this was where they had to come to to get water? Were they all living a peasanty life still?

In the middle of this potential revelation Regina was nudged forward to the front of the platform,

"Ladies and gentlemen," she began, then paused before beginning again, "You do have running water in your houses, right?"

The laugh from the crowd buoyed her. "Excellent. Then aren't we all fortunate to live in a place where a drinking fountain like this is for convenience rather than necessity and," here she gestured to her right, "to have so many dedicated to trying to make this a better place for us all to live." She cut the ribbon to a round of applause. After a show of handshaking and a few photos for the newspaper Regina made her way down the block to the museum.

At the museum they knew the Mayor by name and welcomed her in. Regina, feeling at home in the familiar environment, made her way to her current favourite room, the geology room. Pressing the button on the display in front of her she switched on the ultraviolet light and watched innocuous lumps of brown and grey shine purple and green and opalescent. She'd owned a lot of jewels in her time, and vaguely knew that diamonds were mined, whereas garnets came from the Garnett Mountains, which was an entire mountain range made of the red crystals. Wasn't it? There was nothing in the geology room that made Regina sure if garnett mountains were possible. If they weren't possible here, then had they possible before? Was it possible to have geology in the Enchanted Forest that made garnet mountains real, but not in this land? Or had it been untrue in her own childhood, too. In which case where had the garnets come from? And why did people tell the story of the shining red mountains?

The ideas tangled her mind, and she resolved to find a book on the subject. In the meantime she went back into another of her favourite of the rooms, the history room. There was something comforting about this space full of photos of men and women, of all different ages and colours, who had done something worthwhile. Being only a small town, the objects that Storybook had to illustrate each person's story were sometimes almost comic, but they seemed Regina looked through the glass at them with a kind of reverence. There was a boot worn by the first women from the region to have walked the Appalachian Trail, and next to it a bible supposedly once owned by the president – apparently sometimes even very strong people in this world needed belief in something they couldn't quite see.

Regina reached out, as if she would be able to put her hand through into the cabinet and caress the objects. She read every word on the little paper tags, even though she had read them all before.

Once her feet began to tire Regina found her way to the cafeteria to have lunch. She preferred to cook for herself, but enjoyed the atmosphere in the museum cafe. She took a seat at a table by the floor-to-ceiling windows that looked over a courtyard, and ordered an apple tart (the chef here managed to make them crisp up in a way that Regina couldn't yet manage), and opened the only book on geology that gift shop had had.

The book fell open in the middle, at a glossy spread on diamonds. It was Rumplestiltskin had tuahgt Regina about diamonds. Not the children's stories about how they were mined by cheery dwarves, but how they could be used to lock-up ideas. Being the strongest, strongest substance, they were the only things that could be used to hold something as strong as True Love. They worked effectively to keep unhappiness away from people too.

She closed the book. There was so much that she knew that she would never again be able to talk about. Once upon a time she had known things, and been respected. Rumple had given her knowledge, and asked her questions and made her into someone who had achieved a lot.

_Was it really him in the street?_

Could she go through this alone? She thought of Michelle, and Archie – could they be enough? Oh, she knew what it was like to be alone. She knew what it was like to have people turn on her.

_Was it really him?_

She knew who it was who had always been there. It hadn't always been perfect. But he had kept her from having to be alone.

_Was it really him?_

Regina put the book in her bag, tucked a five dollar bill under the plate and stood. She straightened her dress and walked out of that place like she was someone who knew exactly where she was going and why.


	5. Chapter 5

**CHAPTER 5**

1984

"Mr Gold." Regina Mills gave a nod as she entered the pawn shop trying to look as much as possible like a mayor looking for a gift for a friend or a knickknack for her office, rather than like a scared little girl following after her mentor/captor.

"Mayor Mills," replied the shop's proprietor, putting down the candlestick he had been polishing. "How can I help you today? I must say – if you don't mind - you are looking rather fine today. Something is agreeing with you."

Regina tried to smile, and nodded again. That was what people here did when spoken to by shopkeepers. Except that, the closer to him she got, the more Regina found that he was not a person from Storybrooke anymore. Here, so close that she could, quite literally, smell the still-familiar scent of his cologne and his sweat, and hear the rhythm of his breathing, here she was that little girl who needed this man. She didn't dare turn her head to look him in the eye. She willed herself to keep browsing objects on the shelves in front of her. She couldn't meet his eyes, because what if he saw her and he knew her, what if she saw him and she knew him and she became the Evil Queen or Leopold's wife or –

"How much for this?" she asked pointing to the first thing that even remotely took her attention. It was a teacup with a tree on it. Michelle would like it.

"Ah ha," Mr Gold leant over the counter. "A wise choice. An apple tree I believe. _Malus domestica_. Often used by other cultures as a sign of love and romance, although in this culture they prefer the rose as a symbol of all that mushy stuff. Mind you," and here he reached out and plucked the cup from Regina's hands and she found herself turning her head to meet his eyes, "the apple tree is in the same family as the rose, I believe. So, in this passing between the two of us, I imagine that we have given some sort of message recognisable across cultures, time and any other boundary.

"Do you agree?"

Regina looked up from where she was fiddling for her purse in her bag, met the older man's eyes, and replied,

"I'm not sure that I do, Mr Gold." She held his gaze with her own. Looking for some sign of recognition.

It was Mr Gold who broke the stare,

"You're looking confused, Madame Mayor. I only said a minute ago how happy you'd been looking."

Regina took the wrapped cup he was offering her and turned to go.

"I must say, you look more... I don't know what – regal? – when you're not smiling. Unpleasantness suits you."

Regina stopped walking and moved slowly to face him.

"All this opening new drinking fountains, giving money to the library, making friends with the help. I'm not sure any of that is how I expected a mayor to behave."

It was him. Oh it was him. And he did not make her feel like she was finding an old friend.

"I'll do as I please; it is my town now."

"Maybe, maybe. But it's a curse, dearie. It's not meant to be pleasant. Who knows what happens if you don't hold onto your end of the deal. Will it break? Will Snow White suddenly find her Happy Ending? Does an amateur like you really want to be playing around with a curse?"

Regina's hands twitched, oh how she wanted, wanted to have her magic and be able to do _something_ to this vile creature. But, oh, there he was, the only person who truly knew who she had been. She'd read enough here in Storybrooke to know that that was the sort of thing that friendship was made of. She could have Mistress Mary sitting by her fire talking about apple trees all she wanted, but Mistress Mary would never be someone who had known her as a child or been there for her through her darkest times.

So she held out her hand,

"Rumple."

"So you want to be friends now, dearie." Mr Gold came out from behind the counter and stepped towards Regina, "I don't know about that. You see I think that maybe you thought that I wouldn't be here."

"Of course you would." Regina said, not letting herself be intimidated (not letting herself be weak and in need of a friend) and stepping towards the man. She didn't move like she was approaching a friend, but like a queen and a minion, trying to counteract the necessary deference in her next line, "Of course I thought you'd be here, it's your curse."

"You didn't seek me out though. Did you think that you could go 28 years without me? Remember you get 28 years of happiness. They get 28 years of curse, and then it all - " and here he used his hands somersaulting over one another in front of her face to illustrate "- it all flips over. That is, unless somebody fails to uphold their end of the deal."

Regina, getting used to people talking to her seriously and seriously seeking her opinion, almost let her guard done and smiled. Instead she remembered at the last minute, how to harden her face and to smirk, "nothing to worry about there, then," before turning, as if wearing a gown not a pantsuit, and left Rumple behind, with the bell jingling after her.

So, Rumple was still thinking about the breaking of the curse. He was still thinking about Bae, although Regina had promised herself to never even _think _his name, should Rumple somehow find out that she even knew he existed_. _This was going to work. It was only 28 years. She could do this. As for that rubbish about her messing with the curse, if only he knew -

_Except, if he knew – _

The next day Regina wore black and told a meeting of the town council that she was going to close the new sportsgrounds.


End file.
